Piano Man
by Zayz
Summary: Very slightly Huddy, not overtly romantic. "She remembers many things, like the smell of his hair and the rough texture of his gray coat...but what she remembers most is the piano, that old dusty grand piano in the corner room of the second floor." R&R?


**A/N**: Erm…I'm not really sure what this is. It's just something I was brooding over in school today and I wrote it in about an hour. It's kind of depressing and I know it's not particularly wonderful, but I was inspired. It's all pronouns, but it's meant to be about House and Cuddy.

I'm not a big _House_ writer. This is my second fic. But I dunno, there's something about it that I find decent enough, and so I posted it. Here you go. Enjoy?

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**Piano Man  
****By: Zayz**

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It's easy to remember all the bad times with him, mostly because there are a plethora of instances to choose from. However, what requires the most out of her is to remember all the good times – because honestly, they've had a plethora of those too.

He's terrible with emotions. Those reveal weaknesses, irrationality, cracks in the foundation. He perpetually acts fourteen years old, particularly when she doesn't need him to; and when it comes time to retreat, two stubborn people walk away angry, and he goes off to sulk in the silent haven of his office.

He spends so much of his time alone. He worries her, even if she will never state this aloud.

She remembers at the most arbitrary moments – during the night when she can't sleep, during the day when she should be thinking of everything else – all those times when they used to fight in medical school. Those memories stay with her in the strangest ways, tugging at her and filling her with the cavernous sighs that come from deep within her core.

She remembers many things, like the smell of his hair and the rough texture of his gray coat and how he would smirk at her as they crossed the front of the large campus. But what she remembers most is the piano, that old dusty grand piano in the corner room of the second floor.

He only ever played it when they fought, she recollects. They would argue, something about his childish misdeeds or the answer to a medical inquiry or the subject of a lecture, and they would blow up, say terrible things to each other that they couldn't take back. It was stupid, so incredibly stupid, and they both knew it, but he would say something final, low, cutting, before he finished it and went straight to that wretched piano.

As much as he pretended to abhor her, he loved the piano. It was practically ancient, rarely ever used by anyone but him, and so it became his, the one weakness he could stand to allow himself to have. Sometimes he would compose there, compose complex intricacies stemming from one simple line of melody; and other times he would just let himself go, play whatever song he could think of.

There were days when he would play rough, and raw, and turbulent, and achingly wounded, a flurry of notes hammered against the tired ivory keys. Other days, he would play dark, murky, forgotten music that chilled her inexplicably, sent shivers down her spine. He never played anything cheerful, or buoyant, but sometimes she could swear she heard some chord buried in any given composition that sounded the least bit hopeful. She would listen for it, listen carefully at the door, hoping to hear some expression of care; but most nights, he would let her down.

He had a habit of letting her down back then. He still lets her down to this day. But she knows she always comes back for more because even if he's lost all semblances of hope in himself, she hasn't. Someone who does what he does, plays how he plays, he could never have hit rock bottom. He hovers over it, just enough that he can stare it in the face but can also pull himself away from it. He lingers at an impasse, he did even in medical school when his future was bright and he had time, and she could hear it in his playing. She felt like she knew him intimately when he played, even if he never knew she was there, just outside his cocoon of private despair, pondering his hurt.

After medical school, she never heard him play again. Their lives branched off into separate directions, allowing them to dance around each other in their everyday routines, but never did he play his piano once graduation day came to pass. There are stolen glimpses in time when she idly wonders what became of his piano playing, those frustrated, angry emotions he used to indulge. They don't really have a piano at Princeton-Plainsboro, although she occasionally wishes they did, because it would be something to hear him play again after all these years.

There was a night she can recall to mind with pin-point precision in their last year of medical school. It was on Sunday, at the end of the weekend, and his girlfriend of the time – they had dated for but a few weeks – had broken up with him. He had been moody, moodier than usual, so she had asked him what had gone wrong, if there was anything she could do. He had refused her and she got defensive, her hands on her hips and her eyes blazing, as she demanded to know why he never told her anything. She only wanted to help. He had fought back, demanding why she needed to be part of his life when they clearly had nothing in common, and they had bickered bitterly until she exploded, telling him he was too gruff to be likeable and he would spend the rest of his life alone.

It was a careless thing to say, but he took it harder than she would have expected, and of course he went to the piano room and she followed along, heart beating fast, unsure of the damage she had inflicted. He sat in the piano room a long time, the silence more agonizing than his music could be, until finally, many unbearable minutes later, he began to play.

The notes were barely there, whisper-thin, and she had to strain to listen. The song was subdued and lonely and simple, twinkling like a music box or a flickering star, faded and quietly poignant. She didn't know if he wrote it himself or if he learned it somewhere, but it reminded her so much of him that it broke her heart a million times over to hear him bring it to life with his sensitive fingers.

He stopped playing eventually, the silence swirling around them both, and she stood in that deserted hallway with tears welling in her eyes and her throat clogged up, dry. She couldn't find it in her to move. But he came out of there suddenly before she could leave and he saw her, his sharp blue eyes catching her murkier blue-gray ones for just long enough

She saw her ache in him and she was sure he could see his in her, but he never said so, never said a word. He just stared at her and tried to rebuild himself, even though it was too late and she already knew. She parted her lips as if to speak, but she didn't, she didn't, and he walked away like he was so good at doing, leaving her there in his wake, watching him go.

He never made mention of it, never acted like anything special had passed between them. It was predictable, even if depressing. But he was careful to never play for her after that, made sure she wasn't in the hallway when he retired to the piano room on nights when he could not handle himself anymore.

She wishes he would play again. Socially, he cannot conduct proper conversation for more than thirty seconds, but when it comes to the piano, he is a different person. It's like he stows his humanity away in the instrument, where he can keep it safe from everyone else.

She wishes he would play again. These days, when that old pain haunts his aging eyes like ivy spreading unchecked, she just wants to know that the person she heard pouring his pain into the piano still maintains its fragile existence in him somewhere.

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**A/N**: Please be gentle in your reviews.


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